1. Thursday, October 15, 2009
10,000
REASONS TO SMILE
CLOSE 10,015.86
HIGH 10,027.73
BREAK 10,000
ABOUT 3:07 P.M.
OPEN
9,873.55
Dow claws way back to milestone
NEW YORK (AP) — ure territory again
TRADERS
When the Dow Jones Wednesday, the most vis- DELIGHT
industrial average first ible sign yet that investors Wednesday
passed 10,000, traders believe the economy is in New York.
tossed commemorative clawing its way back AP photo
caps and uncorked from the worst downturn
champagne. This time since the Depression.
around, the feeling was The milestone caps a
more like relief. stunning 53 percent
The best-known comeback for the Dow
barometer of the stock
market entered five-fig- See DOW, Page C5
Times illustration by CHRISTOPHER REAM; source: E-Trade.com
CALLING ON INDIA AND FRANCE HEALTH-CARE OVERHAUL
Federal option
won’t go quietly
WASHINGTON (AP) — Fears about to using their own employee
high costs of the health care health plans?
overhaul and mistrust of insur- What if public coverage
ers are rekindling interest in let- were offered only as a back-
ting the government sell health stop in areas where one insur-
insurance as part of the plan. er has a lock on the market?
The leading congressional “We are all talking together,
proposal as of Wednesday — a trying to find something that not
Senate Finance bill that relies everyone will love but the entire
on private coverage with no new (Democratic) caucus will come
government plan — could price to agreement on,” said Sen.
out some 17 million Americans. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who for
And the insurance industry may months has been seeking a polit-
have unwittingly helped the ically viable compromise.
case for public coverage with a “It’s going to be something
report over the weekend assert- flexible, but not weak,”
ing the finance bill would raise Schumer added. His idea: a
premiums for everyone. federal plan that states can
Business groups and conser- opt out of.
AP photo by BIKAS DAS vatives remain steadfastly The lone Republican to back
opposed to government insur- health-care overhaul legisla-
ance — formidable political tion, Maine Sen. Olympia
opposition that shows no sign Snowe, has suggested a possible
ALBANIA WANTS REMAINS of weakening. So advocates are
getting creative, trying to refor-
mulate the “public option” in a
way that can gain the 60 votes
way out: allowing a public plan
to kick in if competition among
health insurance companies
under a revamped system fails
OF MOTHER TERESA, KING needed to clear the Senate.
Instead of an all-or-nothing
approach, they’re trying to
to bring down costs. Snowe is
opposed to government insur-
ance as a first-line solution.
provide choices. What if Snowe’s idea is com-
What if each state could bined with an approach that
S
treet dwellers eat food at a distribution center of the Mis- WHO THEY WERE decide whether to offer public lets states make the call?
sionaries of Charity, the order founded by Mother Teresa, ● Macedonia and Albania have coverage instead of having it “Those are all elements that
in Calcutta, India, on Wednesday. Albania wants the been engaged in a dispute over the decreed from Washington — one could easily fashion into
national identity of Mother Teresa, as proposed by Sen. Tom Carp- an outcome that would seem
remains of Nobel Peace laureate Mother Teresa and the only er, D-Del.? to be elegant,” said economist
post-independence monarch to be returned to the country, the who was born in Macedonia to an What if states had a menu of Len Nichols of the New Amer-
prime minister said Friday. ethnic Albanian family. She went to options, from nonprofit co-ops ica Foundation.
Calcutta, India, in 1929, and dedi-
Mother Teresa’s remains are in India and King Ahmet Zog’s in
cated herself to the service of the
France. Prime Minister Sali Berisha’s government has asked India
poor and infirm, receiving the Nobel
for the Roman Catholic nun’s remains to be returned by the Peace Prize in 1979. After her death
100th anniversary of her birth in August. in 1997, she was buried in Calcutta, STUDIES
Berisha said Albania has started negotiations with India’s gov- and Pope John Paul II beatified her in
ernment, which “will be intensified this year.” 2003. Albania’s main airport outside
“The Albanian government took this decision recognizing
Ahmet Zog ... as one of the greatest, most distinguished person-
alities with a major contribution in the history of the Albanian
the capital, Tirana, is named after
Mother Teresa.
● King Ahmet Zog was the small
Some frail elderly
nation,” Berisha told a news conference.
Berisha said the king’s remains would be reinterred at the for-
mer Albanian royal family’s private cemetery near Tirana, with-
Balkan country’s first — and only —
post-independence monarch, reign-
ing from 1928 to 1939, when he fled
receive futile care
after Albania’s occupation by fascist
out specifying when that was expected. LOS ANGELES (AP) — A surprising nally ill cancer patients.
Italy. He died in France in 1961 and number of frail, elderly Ameri- “We probably need to be
There has been no reaction from the royal family or French is buried at the Thiais Cemetery near cans in nursing homes are suf- offering a palliative care option
authorities. — AP Paris. fering from futile care at the to many more patients to make
end of their lives, two new fed- the last days of their lives as
erally funded studies reveal. comfortable as possible,” said
One found that putting nurs- Dr. Mark Zeidel of the Beth
ing home residents with fail- Israel Deaconess Medical Cen-
EXPLORERS: ing kidneys on dialysis didn’t
improve their quality of life
ter in Boston, who was not
involved in the studies.
and may even push them into Palliative care focuses on
North Pole summers will be ice-free in 10 years further decline. The other
showed many with advanced
dementia will die within six
managing symptoms of a dis-
ease and a main goal is to
relieve pain at the end of life.
LONDON (AP) — The North Pole will Their findings show that most of the data. “The area is now more likely months and perhaps should End-of-life care became a
turn into an open sea during sum- ice in the region is first-year ice that is to become open water each sum- have hospice care instead of divisive issue in the national
mer within a decade, according to only around 6 feet deep and will melt mer, bringing forward the potential aggressive treatment. health care reform debate this
data released by a team of explor- next summer. The region has tradi- date when the summer sea ice will Medical experts say the new summer after one proposal
ers who trekked through the Arctic tionally contained thicker multiyear be completely gone.” research emphasizes the need included Medicare reimburse-
for three months ice that does not melt as rapidly. Wadhams said Wednesday that for doctors, caregivers and ment for doctors who consult
The Catlin Arctic Survey team, led “With a larger part of the region the Catlin Arctic Survey data sup- families to consider making with patients on end-of-life
by explorer Pen Hadow, measured the now first-year ice, it is clearly more ports the new consensus that the the feeble elderly who are counseling. Critics called the
thickness of the ice as it sledged and vulnerable,” said Professor Peter Arctic will be ice-free in summer near death comfortable rather counseling “death panels”
hiked through the northern part of the Wadhams, part of the Polar Ocean within 20 years and that much of than treating them as if a cure and a step toward euthanasia.
Beaufort Sea in the North Pole earlier Physics Group at the University of the decrease will happen within 10 were possible — more like the
this year during a research project. Cambridge which analyzed the years. palliative care given to termi- See FUTILE, Page C2